Not that I was looking forward to this, but I definitely didn’t prevent it. My daughter learned the word “no”.

It was as if she woke up one day with an attitude and it hasn’t gone away yet. She even has given me the ‘stink eye’! What 16 month old know’s how to make a ‘stink eye’?!?!

The first time she used ‘the word’, we were in the grocery store and her dad was going to leave with her since she was making a scene. She said “nononononono” over and over again.

Then she said it again the next day when I was trying to get her out of the car and was taking her book away from her. This time it was a simple “no”.

Now she says it all the time. She has decided that she doesn’t want to give up anything. If it is in her hands, you better not touch it unless she offers it to you.

If just her saying “no” wasn’t enough, she has also started the tantrums. I thought that the time she cried as we took a doll away from her at a store was a tantrum. I was so wrong. So very, very wrong.

Her tantrums are moments of pure anger. She doesn’t necessarily cry. She screams. In short intervals. And she hits and throws things. Usually her tantrums only last a few seconds (yeah, I know this won’t last, they will soon be MUCH longer) so they are still kind of comical. I have even caught myself laughing OUT LOUD when she is throwing one.